Saturday, 19 July 2014

The
detective novel Celle qui n’était plus
by Pierre Boileau and Thomas Narcejac has proved itself to be a very durable
and influential work for cinema. The first screen adaptation came in 1955 with
the peerless French production Les
Diaboliques, which was expertly and stylishly directed by the brilliant
Henri-Georges Clouzot. This in turn was a major influence on Alfred Hitchcock
who turned to the work of Boileau-Narcejac for his 1958 production Vertigo, and who also incorporated some
of their narrative strategies in Psycho
(1960). In Britain a whole slew of monochrome psychological thrillers were
produced by Hammer, who were inspired by the resounding commercial success of Psycho, but sought their inspiration
from Les Diaboliques. This is most keenly
felt in Taste of Fear (1962 – UStitle Scream of Fear)which is
replete with a swimming pool, and a fragile female protagonist. A rather drab
and forgettable TV movie remake of Les
Diaboliques appeared in 1993 under the title House of Secrets, airing on NBC it starred Bruce Boxleitner as the
abusive spouse, Melissa Gilbert as the weak hearted wife, and Kate Vernon as
the mistress. A $45 million remake followed in 1996 under the title Diabolique, and though it was
intriguingly cast with Sharon Stone and Isabella Adjani, it failed to reach a
sizeable audience and was universally panned by critics. Where these two films
failed ABC’s movie-of-the-week
Reflections of Murder, which aired on 24th November 1974,
manages to succeed, and emerges as the second best screen adaptation of Boileau
and Narcejac’s important novel.

Thursday, 17 July 2014

The
1974 ‘Euro-crime’ film Street Law is
one of my personal favourites of the cycle. I took a risk on it when I imported
Blue Underground’s DVD release of the film back in 2006. But I’ve always found
that particular distributor to be very reliable in terms of quality and
interest. The film was my entry point into the violent, exciting, reactionary,
and uncompromising world of the Italian ‘Euro-crime’ cycle and for this I owe
the film a debt of gratitude. The director of the film was Enzo G. Castellari
who was no stranger to the various cycles that constituted popular cinema in
Italy in the 1960’s and 1970’s. Castellari’s early westerns were rather drab
and predictable affairs, singularly unmemorable, and offered little promise of
the films to come. The first hint of Castellari’s capabilities came in the war
film Eagles over London (1969). He
followed this with the dour and lacklustre giallo Cold Eyes of Fear (1971), which unsurprisingly remained his only
entry in this cycle. For the next few
years Castellari concentrated on crime pictures, creating an impressive and
consistent body of work which included High
Crime (1973), The Big Racket
(1976), The Heroin Busters (1977),
and Day of the Cobra (1980).

Tuesday, 15 July 2014

Genre
cinema in the Netherlands is pretty much non-existent, and this probably has a
great deal to do with the fact that the majority of indigenous production
relies on government funding. The cultural unworthiness of the horror genre,
which is still viewed by some as little more than the outpourings of
underdeveloped and immature minds, is never likely to find a great deal of
sympathy in a film culture dependent on state subsidies. Nevertheless there
have been a few co-productions over the years, and a handful of horror projects
categorised as Dutch have emerged to blink confusedly in the light of the
international arena. The name Dick Maas is at the epicentre of this tiny cycle
thanks to The Lift, Amsterdamned (1988 – an underrated and
criminally under-seen film which is arguably the greatest Dutch horror film), The Shaft (2001 – a remake of The Lift starring Naomi Watts no less!),
and Saint (2010). In recent years the
Dutch director Tom Six has stolen the headlines with his execrable Human Centipede films, the first of
which was deceptively amusing, but the sequel was little more than an exercise
in gross repugnance, and was unsurprisingly an American production. Other
noteworthy Dutch horror films worth investigating include The Johnsons (1992), Necrophobia
(2005 – for fans of Nekromantik
[1988], if there are any!), and Two Eyes
Staring (2010).

Friday, 11 July 2014

1973
was a very busy and productive year for English actor Oliver Reed. He began it in the Italian/French
co-production Dirty Weekend, a
crime/comedy directed by Dino Risi, which paired him up with Marcello
Mastroianni. He followed this with the
historical drama Frenzy, an Italian/UK
co-production exploring the class divides in pre-revolutionary Russia, in which
he played Palizyn opposite Claudia Cardinale’s Anya. He continued his
association with Italian cinema in his following film Revolver (US title Blood on
the Streets) an excellent crime thriller directed by Sergio Sollima, which
saw Reed and Fabio Testi make unlikely allies as they uncover a far reaching
political conspiracy. Reed’s biggest success of 1973 was his following film,
playing Athos in Richard Lester’s spirited and entertaining screen version of The Three Musketeers. Reed’s fifth and
final screen credit of 1973 was in the obscure British film Blueblood, based on Alexander Thynne’s
novel The Carry Cot. There are those
who classify Blueblood as a horror
film, but it is more of a class drama in the mould of the Pinter/Losey
production The Servant (1962). The
motivations of the respective butler’s in each film are pretty much the same,
but their methodology differs. In Blueblood
Tom, played with the hulking brutishness and barely suppressed rage that became
Reed’s stock in trade, utilises witchcraft to secure his aims.

Wednesday, 9 July 2014

The
big three directors who inhabit the murky, tough, and violent world of the Italian
‘Euro-crime’ cycle are Fernando Di Leo, Umberto Lenzi, and Stelvio Massi. It
seems that history has been the kindest to Di Leo, who has selected titles
available in high definition and is generally regarded as an important
filmmaker in the landscape of popular Italian cinema. Fairing slightly worse is
Umberto Lenzi, and this is almost entirely due to his risible cannibal
escapades rather than his solid, if unexceptional, entries in the ‘Euro-crime’
and ‘Giallo’ cycles. Due to the vagaries of distribution the filmography of
Massi is the least explored of the three, and as a result Massi is not
discussed anywhere near as prolifically as the other two men. Although all
three filmmakers owe debts of gratitude to the Hollywood films that inspired
them, perhaps Massi most of all showed his influences a little too freely. This
can be seen most keenly in his 1975 thriller Mark the Narc which is one of the most rigorous pastiches of the
first two films to feature Clint Eastwood as San Francisco detective Harry
Callaghan.

The Celluloid Highway's Film of the Week

Introduction

This site seeks to explore the less well travelled roads and avenues of the cinematic highway. The dust and tumbleweed of a ghost town full of obscure and forgotten gems awaits the more adventurous prospectors. In addition to regular forays off the beaten track you will find most popular genres covered, especially horror, science-fiction and those films that can be classified as cult. Popular trends and cycles in European and World cinema are regularly explored and often sit alongside towering examples of art cinema. Any comments and observations are always welcomed and appreciated. Without further ado buckle your seat belt, start your engine, and begin your journey down The Celluloid Highway.

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